


Ar Fayra: The Blaze of This World's Soul

by Sami_Fire



Category: Promare (2019)
Genre: Ar Tonelico - Freeform, Fandom Splice, Gen, song magic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-08
Updated: 2020-01-07
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:34:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22165705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sami_Fire/pseuds/Sami_Fire
Summary: In this fic, elements from the Ar Tonelico series of games are spliced into Promare's setting. These elements include the presence of song magic formed by feelings and memories and the Hymmnos languages that are found throughout Ar Tonelico's songs. Various technologies and powers now work through the execution of commands that manifest as song magic. While most song magic passes through the Foresight Foundation's song server on its way to achieving form, the Burnish's song magic is made all the more dangerous by the fact that no one knows where or what their song server is. As Galo, Lio, and the others learn the truth about the world they live in and the nature of the Burnish and their songs, the fate of the world hangs in the balance.
Relationships: Lio Fotia/Galo Thymos
Kudos: 7





	Ar Fayra: The Blaze of This World's Soul

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to the beginning of something new.
> 
> Ar Fayra is essentially the welding of my favorite things together: Promare's setting and characters with Ar Tonelico's fascinating worldbuilding and mechanics. While this may appear to be a straightforward canon adaptation at first, you'll begin to notice that things don't quite work as you would expect in the regular Promare world. When feelings pass through a "server" that grants them a form and effect, you have song magic. That concept is key to understanding what's going on in this fic. The melding of the two worlds' mechanics allows for some interesting setting tweaks, as you'll see as we go on.
> 
> If you have questions about how something works in this fic (and I'm sure you will), please feel free to ask and I'll do my best to answer.

Somewhere in the distance, faint tones rang out as the Mad Burnish sung their armor into existence.

It was an intuitive process by now, accessing the new type of song magic that had appeared in this world with the first Burnish. Most song magic users in Promepolis accessed their songs through their connections to the Foresight Foundation’s song server, but the Burnish worked differently. They never knew where their song server was, only that it existed, and it provided them with a new language to call upon their flames with.

“You ready, Boss?” Gueira asked from Lio’s right, ready to strike in his behemoth armor.

“The Mad Burnish strike again,” Meis murmured, fiddling with the handlebars of his bike. “We’re ready whenever you are. Operation _Spitze Fayra_ begins.”

Operation “freedom’s fire” commenced, a rescue mission disguised as a vicious attack. Lio Fotia took a deep breath and called upon his memories and feelings, the building blocks of any song magic in this world. A synthesized ostinato rippled through the air, and ushering in the great Burnish Flare was a brilliant tone proudly declaring its intent in the tongue only the Burnish truly knew.

_xA rre ciel mAtAy.y. fayra/.  
(The world brings forth fire.)_

_mArA dea ciel/.  
(I shall burn with it!)_

A building erupted into distinct pink and green flames, and Gueira and Meis cheered at their boss’s strength. “Your song sends tingles down my back every time,” Gueira said, pumping a fist emphatically.

“He’s the most powerful of us for a reason,” Meis said, revving his bike. “Let’s go!”

The blazing trio rode their flames up into the building, positioning themselves precisely in the middle of the conflagration. The smoke and growing flares obscured them from view, and they waited for the next stage of the plan.

A great fusillade of drums brought everyone to attention soon enough.

“We’ve got company,” Meis said.

The great presence of horns filled the air, and a masculine choir boomed.

_Was yea ra gyen fayra spiritum!  
(My soul is ablaze!)_

“Standard Hymmnos,” Gueira noted. “Looks like Promepolis is sending their best and brightest out to meet us.”

A frigid whirlwind rose to counter the Mad Burnish’s flames, and when the wind and smoke cleared, a man with spiky blue hair stood in rescue mech armor. He was carrying something that Lio couldn’t quite identify, perhaps a spear or staff that amplified song magic. Having another potential amplifier aside from the natural amplification of a rescue team’s mech suits would complicate matters.

And then the man started talking, rambling on and on forever about “men who fought fire with their bare hands” and “matoi” and “fireball bastards” and Lio completely lost interest.

“So much for ‘best and brightest,’” Gueira quipped. “He’s just an idiot.”

“Yep, definitely an idiot,” Meis concurred. “Let’s take him out.”

With synchronized battle cries, Gueira and Meis rode down a road of flames to counter the questionable threat. Lio forged a throne out of his flames, his song magic’s tempo altering slightly to fit the feelings used to power it, and he watched from on high. There was no need for him to get involved just yet, particularly when considering the nature of the plan being carried out today.

Stings of strings and synths rang out as Gueira and Meis launched fiery blasts at the man’s mech, just about tearing the armor apart before the duo decided to showboat and ride literal circles around him. This, too, was part of the plan, though of course what happened next was not.

The man in the damaged mech armor said something to someone on the other side of a communication link, and someone’s song with bright, poppy synths formed a massive whirlwind in the center of the battlefield. Noises both mechanical and magical could be heard from inside the sudden storm, and when it dissipated and the interloper’s song magic stopped, the mech inside had transformed into something fancier. The horns on this man’s song magic crescendoed, and he began to speed around with alarming agility, roaring a bizarre battle cry: “This is _Matoi Tech_!”

From the looks of it, Gueira and Meis were barely able to act before their opponent launched an ice bullet that shattered Meis’s armor and bound him in icy cuffs. Gueira didn’t even get to call out to his downed comrade before he met the same fate.

Inside his armor, Lio swallowed down a pang of anxiety. This was supposed to happen, but it was still worrying to see Gueira and Meis contained for any reason.

“Hey! Big Boss! I’m talking to you!”

It seemed the blue-haired idiot had changed focus and was now jabbering right at him. “Come down and face me, man to man!”

It was time for Lio’s phase of the plan. He leapt from his fiery throne, shattering it and sending shards of flame raining down on his opponent, the song magic producing loud and lengthy synthesized notes as he altered it on the fly. When he landed on the same level as his target, he sang crystallized swords into existence. One landed in his hand while the others shot out at the man in the mech, aiming to nail him to a nearby wall. However, the rescue worker in the mech was surprisingly on top of his own song magic, and rapid drum beats punctuated swings of his staff that shattered the incoming swords.

“Two can play this game!” The drum beats intensified and altered in pattern as the rescue worker manifested ice bullets that encapsulated the Burnish flares in the area. “I made this song magic strong enough to contain any flame. That includes yours!”

If the opponent was doing more than showboating, that statement could very well mean that he had set very high power requirements for his song. A person’s reserves of Symphonic Power and energy only lasted so long, and if this man tired out before Lio finished his part of the plan, all the effort spent getting to this point would have been wasted. Lio opted to take a riskier stance, charging into the fray with his crystallized flame sword.

The firefighter parried his swing and began blathering again. “So, you think it’s fun to burn down people’s homes? The only thing that should be burning is your soul!”

Lio tried hard not to roll his eyes under his armor and settled for a retort. “Stand down. We Burnish do not kill without reason. However, if you continue like this…” He let the threat hang in the air as he struggled against his opponent’s parry. For all the control he had in his armor, this guy had a peculiar oneness with his mech.

“Yeah? What’re you gonna do? I’m used to getting scorched. It’s all part of the job.” The firefighter flashed a grin, and with a triumphant swell of strings, he forced Lio’s sword out of the way and shot a clump of ice right at his head. “Gotcha!”

The attempt to dodge was a failure, and the magical ice slammed into the side of Lio’s helmet, blasting half of it off. The rush of cool air to his face send a shudder through him, and while this apparent loss may have brought Lio closer to his goal, it was still unnerving to let someone else have the upper hand.

The opponent gawked at what had been revealed of Lio’s face. “The hell? You’re just a kid!”

“Who are you to say that to me?” Lio hissed, slicing away several more incoming ice chunks with his sword. “You’re treading dangerous ground here.”

“Yeah, you might even say I’m walking on thin ice!” The firefighter guffawed at his own terrible pun and was swiftly silenced by Lio cleaving off a chunk of his armor.

“You should know better than to be so distractible,” Lio growled as he continued to hack his opponent’s armor to bits. What struck him as odd was that he was receiving very little resistance to this attack aside from a token parry. Either he was dealing with a level of idiocy never before seen, or his opponent was running a gambit of his own. He would ride this course of action out and see which option was the case. Soon enough, he had veritably bounced the man out of the remains of his armor and put him at the end of his blade. “You’re naked. You have nothing left to defend yourself with. What will you do now?”

“Well.” Lio’s opponent grinned, and even with his goal in mind, Lio felt his heart sink. “You seem to have forgotten that I… or rather, we…” Mechanical whirs and various types of song magic slowly increased in volume as they approached. “We are a rescue _team_!”

Two large rescue mechs blasted through a nearby wall, quelling the remaining flames in the area with powerful cooling magic. Suddenly, the parts of the blue-haired man’s mech that had been disassembled began to fly towards Lio at high speed, and he strained his reflexes to swat them away. His attempt to jump over a large mech part sent him slamming into the underside of a rescue plane, and that threw off his equilibrium to the point that he couldn’t recover. The mech parts clustered around him and formed a capsule that compressed and cooled, effectively freezing his armor away.

“Not bad, huh? The song magic my mech channels activates rapid cooling when I do that!” The opponent approached, tossing a snowball in one hand. Judging from the way it failed to deform or flake off when it hit his hand, the snowball must have been song magic as well. Lio’s capsule prison popped open, only for him to get that very same snowball chucked at him. With a piercing chime, the snowball dissolved into flakes, then coalesced into icy cuffs around his arms and legs.

Gritting his teeth against the sudden cold that bound him, Lio had one request. His goal had been satisfied for now, but the fight he’d had begged a simple but vital question. “Just who are you?”

“Galo Thymos,” Lio’s opponent said with a cocky grin. “I go balls to the wall on everything I do. I’ve dedicated my life to protecting people from fire. Now, who are you?”

“Lio. Lio Fotia.”

The introduction didn’t get to go much further before a distinctly military-sounding march cut through the air. 

_Ma ki ra chs ganna colga en tie denera!  
(I shall become the solid ice and capture the wicked!)_

Armored vehicles aggressively arrived on scene, stirring up clouds of dust in their wake. The song magic amplified as a man in massive hulking armor exited one of the vehicles. “What’ve we got here?” A sadistic, twisted smile spread across his face as he approached Lio and grabbed him by the back of his collar, lifting him off the ground. Even as Lio struggled in this man’s hold, the man’s focus was on Galo. “You should know that it is against the law for civilians to fight the Burnish. You could have caused quite a bit of damage here.”

A blonde man with distinctive sunglasses stepped in from behind Galo. “Colonel Vulcan, you should know that we are cleared to combat the Burnish in emergency situations.”

With a dastardly laugh, Vulcan grabbed Galo by the chin with his free hand and yanked him up. “This punk can plead his case in court! Do you plan to be his attorney, Ignis?”

Lio, now hanging limp and awaiting his fate, started grumbling. “Governmental infighting? How petty.”

Vulcan’s intimidating gaze was now on Lio. “Big words for a puny Burnish!” Cackling, he dropped Galo on his rear and threw Lio into one of the armored vehicles like a particularly useless piece of cargo.

As the door slammed behind him, Lio thought he heard Galo shout something about “the Freeze Force taking all the credit.” He was unable to catch more after that. A small mercy was that he had literally landed at Gueira and Meis’s feet inside the vehicle.

“You okay, Boss? Or at least kind of okay?” Gueira asked.

“Seems like that went about as well as it could have,” Meis muttered.

Lio nodded at Gueira from the floor. “Indeed,” he muttered hoarsely as he grasped Meis’s hidden meaning. “We’re almost there.”

The Freeze Force’s military march song magic dimmed, and soon the captured Burnish were on their way.


End file.
